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Tuesday February 27 11:56 AM ET
Runner Baumann's Ban Starts Over
By NESHA STARCEVIC, Associated Press Writer
FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) - The two-year drug ban given to former Olympic champion Dieter Baumann will begin anew because he ran in a meet last weekend.
Track and field's governing body said Tuesday the ban is now valid until through Feb. 25, 2003. The German runner originally had been banned until Jan. 21, 2002.
The IAAF cited an organizational rule stating that if an athlete competes while banned, the period of ineligibility will start over from the time he competed.
``There is no reason why this rule should not apply in this case,'' Istvan Gyulai, secretary general of the International Amateur Athletic Federation, said by telephone from his Monaco office.
Baumann obtained a Frankfurt court order that allowed him to run at the German indoor championship Sunday. The IAAF has suspended eight other German runners who competed against Baumann.
Baumann, the gold medalist at 5,000 meters at the 1992 Olympics, was denied a request by the German federation to be placed on the country's team for the March 9-11 world indoor championship in Lisbon, Portugal.
Frank Hensel, secretary general of the German federation, said Tuesday that Baumann may seek another court injunction to gain a spot on the team.
But he said a German court's ruling would apply only to Germany and IAAF would not be forced to allow Baumann to run in Lisbon.
Baumann won the 3,000-meter race in Dortmund and passed the qualifying standard for the indoor worlds. He was left of the 20-member team announced Monday.
Hensel said the German federation plans to ask the IAAF to delay its final decision on the suspension of eight other runners until an IAAF meeting in Lisbon.
One of the suspended runners, Jan Fitschen, who finished behind Baumann in Dortmund, has been nominated for the team.
``Any athlete who takes part in an event in which he knows another athlete to be ineligible under IAAF rules is himself ineligible,'' the IAAF said Monday.
Baumann had been banned for two years by the IAAF for testing positive for the anabolic steroid nandrolone, after being cleared by German track authorities. Their legal panel ruled there was doubt he knowingly ingested the banned substance and there were irregularities in his urine samples.
Baumann lost his appeal before the Court of Arbitration for Sport and could not compete at the Sydney Olympics.
Traces of nandrolone were found in his toothpaste, which Baumann says was spiked in a plot to discredit him as a prominent critic of drugs in sports. Police investigators have been unable to confirm his theory.
Runner Baumann's Ban Starts Over
By NESHA STARCEVIC, Associated Press Writer
FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) - The two-year drug ban given to former Olympic champion Dieter Baumann will begin anew because he ran in a meet last weekend.
Track and field's governing body said Tuesday the ban is now valid until through Feb. 25, 2003. The German runner originally had been banned until Jan. 21, 2002.
The IAAF cited an organizational rule stating that if an athlete competes while banned, the period of ineligibility will start over from the time he competed.
``There is no reason why this rule should not apply in this case,'' Istvan Gyulai, secretary general of the International Amateur Athletic Federation, said by telephone from his Monaco office.
Baumann obtained a Frankfurt court order that allowed him to run at the German indoor championship Sunday. The IAAF has suspended eight other German runners who competed against Baumann.
Baumann, the gold medalist at 5,000 meters at the 1992 Olympics, was denied a request by the German federation to be placed on the country's team for the March 9-11 world indoor championship in Lisbon, Portugal.
Frank Hensel, secretary general of the German federation, said Tuesday that Baumann may seek another court injunction to gain a spot on the team.
But he said a German court's ruling would apply only to Germany and IAAF would not be forced to allow Baumann to run in Lisbon.
Baumann won the 3,000-meter race in Dortmund and passed the qualifying standard for the indoor worlds. He was left of the 20-member team announced Monday.
Hensel said the German federation plans to ask the IAAF to delay its final decision on the suspension of eight other runners until an IAAF meeting in Lisbon.
One of the suspended runners, Jan Fitschen, who finished behind Baumann in Dortmund, has been nominated for the team.
``Any athlete who takes part in an event in which he knows another athlete to be ineligible under IAAF rules is himself ineligible,'' the IAAF said Monday.
Baumann had been banned for two years by the IAAF for testing positive for the anabolic steroid nandrolone, after being cleared by German track authorities. Their legal panel ruled there was doubt he knowingly ingested the banned substance and there were irregularities in his urine samples.
Baumann lost his appeal before the Court of Arbitration for Sport and could not compete at the Sydney Olympics.
Traces of nandrolone were found in his toothpaste, which Baumann says was spiked in a plot to discredit him as a prominent critic of drugs in sports. Police investigators have been unable to confirm his theory.
